For which, if so the sad offence deserves,
Plung'd in the deep, for ever let me lie
Whelm'd under seas; if death must be my doom,
Let man inflict it, and I die well-pleas'd."
He ended here, and now profuse of tears
In suppliant mood fell prostrate at our feet:
We bade him speak from whence, and what he was,
And how by stress of fortune sunk thus low;
Anchises too with friendly aspect mild
Gave him his hand, sure pledge of amity;
When, thus encouraged, he began his tale.
I'm one, says he, of poor descent, my name
Is Achæmenides, my country Greece,
Ulysses' sad compeer, who whilst he fled.
The raging Cyclops, left me here behind
Disconsolate, forlorn; within the cave
He left me, giant Polypheme's dark cave;
A dungeon wild and horrible, the walls
On all sides furr'd with mouldy damps, and hung
With clots of ropy gore, and human limbs,
His dire repast: himself of mighty size,
Hoarse in his voice, and in his visage grim,
Intractable, that riots on the flesh
Of mortal men, and swills the vital blood.
Him did I see snatch up with horrid grasp
Two sprawling Greeks, in either hand a man;
I saw him when with huge tempestuous sway
He dasht and broke 'em on the grundsil edge;
The pavement swam in blood, the walls around
Were spatter'd o'er with brains. He lapt the blood,
And chew'd the tender flesh still warm with life,
That swell'd and heav'd itself amidst his teeth
As sensible of pain. Not less mean while
Our chief incens'd, and studious of revenge,
Plots his destruction, which he thus effects.
The giant, gorg'd with flesh, and wine, and blood,
Lay stretcht at length and snoring in his den,
Belching raw gobbets from his maw, o'er-charg'd
With purple wine and cruddled gore confused.
We gather'd round, and to his single eye,
The single eye that in his forehead glar'd
Like a full moon, or a broad burnish'd shield,
A forky staff we dext'rously apply'd,
Which, in the spacious socket turning round,
Scoopt out the big round gelly from its orb.
But let me not thus interpose delays;
Fly, mortals, fly this curst detested race:
A hundred of the same stupendous size,
A hundred Cyclops live among the hills,
Gigantick brotherhood, that stalk along
With horrid strides o'er the high mountains' tops,
Enormous in their gait; I oft have heard
Their voice and tread, oft seen 'em as they past,
Sculking and scowring down, half dead with fear.
Thrice has the moon wash'd all her orb in light,
Thrice travell'd o'er, in her obscure sojourn,
The realms of night inglorious, since I've liv'd
Amidst these woods, gleaning from thorns and shrubs
A wretched sustenance. As thus he spoke
We saw descending from a neighb'ring hill
Blind Polypheme; by weary steps and slow
The groping giant with a trunk of pine
Explor'd his way; around his woolly flocks
Attended grazing; to the well-known shore
He bent his course, and on the margin stood,
A hideous monster, terrible, deform'd;
Full in the midst of his high front there gap'd
The spacious hollow where his eye-ball roll'd,
A ghastly orifice: he rins'd the wound,
And wash'd away the strings and clotted blood
That cak'd within; then stalking through the deep
He fords the ocean, while the topmost wave
Scarce reaches up his middle side; we stood
Amaz'd be sure, a sudden horror chill
Ran through each nerve, and thrill'd in ev'ry vein, 'Till using all the force of winds and oars
We sped away; he heard us in our course,
And with his out-stretch'd arms around him grop'd,
But finding nought within his reach, he rais'd
Such hideous shouts that all the ocean shook.
Ev'n Italy, tho' many a league remote,
In distant echoes answer'd; Etna roar'd,
Through all its inmost winding caverns roar'd.
Rous'd with the sound, the mighty family
Of one-ey'd brothers hasten to the shore,
And gather round the bellowing Polypheme,
A dire assembly: we with eager haste
Work ev'ry one, and from afar behold
A host of giants covering all the shore.
So stands a forest tall of mountain oaks
Advanced to mighty growth: the traveller
Hears from the humble valley where he rides
The hollow murmurs of the winds that blow
Amidst the boughs, and at the distance sees
The shady tops of trees unnumber'd rise,
A stately prospect waving in the clouds
Augustus had a design to rebuild Troy, and make it the Metropolis of the Roman Empire, having closeted several Senators on the project: Horace is supposed to have written the following Ode on this occasion:
THE man resolv'd and steady to his trust,
Inflexible to ill, and obstinately just,
May the rude rabble's insolence despise,
Their senseless clamours and tumultuous cries;
The tyrant's fierceness he beguiles,
And the stern brow, and the harsh voice defies,
And with superior greatness smiles.
Not the rough whirlwind, that deforms
Adria's black gulf, and vexes it with storms,
The stubborn virtue of his soul can move;
Not the red arm of angry Jove,
That flings the thunder from the sky,
And gives it rage to roar, and strength to fly.
Should the whole frame of nature round him break,
In ruin and confusion hurl'd,
He, unconcern'd, would hear the mighty crack,"
And stand secure amidst a falling world.
a Crack. Plainly used here for the sake of the rhyme; for the poet knew very well that the word was low and vulgar. To ennoble it a little he adds the epithet "mighty," which yet, has only the effect to make it even ridiculous.
[This unfortunate line has been not unworthily recorded in the "Art of Sinking in Poetry."-G.]
Such were the godlike arts that led Bright Pollux to the blest abodes: Such did for great Alcides plead,
And gain'd a place among the gods;
Where now Augustus, mix'd with heroes, lies,
And to his lips the nectar bowl applies:
His ruddy lips the purple tincture show,
And with immortal strains divinely glow.
By arts like these did young Lyæus rise:
His tigers drew him to the skies,
Wild from the desert and unbroke:
In vain they foam'd, in vain they star'd,
In vain their eyes with fury glar'd,
He tam'd 'em to the lash, and bent 'em to the yoke.
Such were the paths that Rome's great founder trod, When in a whirlwind snatch'd on high,
He shook off dull mortality,
And lost the monarch in the god.
Bright Juno then her awful silence broke,
And thus th' assembled deities bespoke.
Troy, says the goddess, perjur'd Troy has felt
The dire effects of her proud tyrant's guilt;
The towering pile, and soft abodes,
Wall'd by the hand of servile gods,
Now spreads its ruins all around,
And lies inglorious on the ground.
An umpire, partial and unjust,
And a lewd woman's impious lust,
Lay heavy on her head, and sink her to the dust.
Since false Laomedon's tyrannic sway,
That durst defraud th' immortals of their pay,
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